Hello everyone, I’m currently 23 and attending a community college in upstate New York. I have stellar grades and will be graduating with an honors computer science associates degree Spring 2016.
I am looking into a few schools (e.g. RPI, Stony Brook, RIT, Cornell), and am worried about the financial aid that I will receive due to myself having to claim independent status on the fafsa next year when I apply.
I currently have a job making minimum wage (8.75) at OIT on my college campus and plan to make ~5000 pre tax dollars between the work I’ve done here over the summer and the work I will do while in class this upcoming semester.
I currently live with my parents and they are probably planning on claiming me on their taxes. I should mention they do not contribute any money towards my schooling and I have max pell and tap award which covers my tuition at my current school.
What should I know in regards to applying for financial aid and the subsequent aid I will receive?
Will I be granted less aid because I am an independent and still live with my parents while attending school?
Do colleges like RPI, RIT, and Cornell give less need based aid granted from the college to independents?
Thanks everyone and please share as much information as you possibly can!
I don’t think you have to worry much about being independent or not since you seem to indicate that your parents are low income–that’s why you qualify for Pell, yes? Cornell will meet full need for students of low income parents. That is really different than being independent with high income parents who just don’t want to contribute. So it doesn’t matter. But the schools that don’t ‘meet need’ it may matter.